The early fiction has been viewed as the necessary literary preparation for the mature work and especially of One Hundred Years of Solitude. Yet to suggest that the short stories are apprentice pieces is to detract from their real artistry, their subtlety and their narrative techniques. Given their remarkable literary qualities, it is strange that they should have received such scant critical attention. In this essay, I should like to consider one technique, that of characterization, as a starting point for a fuller appraisal of the early stories and, perhaps, of the major works. After all, García Márquez once said in conversation to Miguel Fernández-Braso, ‘in reality one only writes a single book’ (Gabriel García Márquez [una conversacion infinita), Madrid, 1969, p. 44). He went on to reveal his consuming interest in his early characters which culminated in One Hundred Years of Solitude ‘which is the basis of the jigsaw which I have been assembling in my early books. The key, therefore, is to be found in my first works.’ In what follows the analysis is necessarily selective, a starting point for a complete study.

Much of the appeal of the stories in Big Mama's Funeral, as much as in the major novels, lies in the subtlety and allusiveness – even elusiveness – of characterization. Many of his characters are taken from the classical repertoire of the eternally comic, including characters who through their disharmony or absurdity in behaviour or dress, or who by involvement in disguises, tricks, beatings, petty criminality, or indecent behaviour, create humorous situations which can affect all readers at all times.